Members Church of God International (Ang Dating Daan)
Members Church of God International (Ang Dating Daan) belongs to the Latin American and Filipino-initiated churches family of churches.
Governance: hierarchical.
The Philippine-founded church known by its broadcast "Ang Dating Daan" (The Old Path); non-trinitarian in ways distinct from Iglesia Ni Cristo, with US chapters in the Filipino diaspora. Described by self-description per taxonomy rules.
Congregation count not yet source-verified against RCMS 2020; NULL rather than estimated.
The church of the "Ang Dating Daan" broadcast — Philippine-founded, Bible-exposition centered, and non-trinitarian by its own account in ways distinct from other Philippine bodies.
Heritage
Members Church of God International is best known by its broadcast, "Ang Dating Daan" (The Old Path), among the longest-running religious programs in Philippine broadcasting. The church stands in a lineage of Philippine Church of God bodies reaching back through Nicolas Perez, and grew to prominence under Eliseo Soriano, its Overall Servant, whose marathon live Bible expositions — questions answered on air, Bibles open — became its signature; Soriano led the church, latterly from abroad, until his death in 2021. US chapters gather members of the Filipino diaspora around worship services and satellite-linked Bible expositions.
Theological family
By self-description, non-trinitarian in a form distinct from the Iglesia ni Cristo: MCGI honors the Father as the almighty God and Jesus Christ as a divine Son and savior — a mediating position that is itself part of its dispute with the INC — while rejecting classical trinitarian formulation. Trinitarian bodies differ, noted here once; this record reports the church's own teaching and adjudicates nothing.
Who decides what
Centralized around its leading ministers ("Overall Servants") and workers, with chapters worldwide joined by live video to central gatherings — a church whose polity is, in practice, its broadcast.
What a first-time visitor would find
Bible expositions are the heart: extended, verse-quoting question-and-answer teaching, received live or by link; services include hymns, prayer and giving, with an ethic of anonymous charity the church emphasizes (blood donation drives and free clinics are prominent works).
What it has always cared about
Scripture quoted chapter-and-verse as the answer to everything — biblical literacy as devotion; mass media as meetinghouse; charitable works done, by policy, without soliciting donations from outsiders.
Its gift to the wider church
MCGI's free clinics, transient homes and blood drives — charity as apologetic — witness to the wider church that doctrinal minorities can still lead in works of mercy, and its exposition format has made daily Bible engagement a mass Filipino practice.
Commonly confused with
With the Iglesia ni Cristo, its historic broadcast rival — both Philippine-founded and non-trinitarian, but doctrinally and organizationally distinct and publicly at odds; and with trinitarian Filipino evangelical churches.
Range of views inside it
Practice is uniform by broadcast; variation lies mainly in chapter size and country.
A note from the mapmakers: Nothing here may be asserted of a specific chapter or member. The church's doctrine is stated by its self-description per our taxonomy rules. No verified US congregation count is available from RCMS 2020, so this record carries none. Sentences drawn from this record hedge as "MCGI chapters typically…" and yield to the church's own materials.
Sources: Members Church of God International — about (MCGI) · Melton's Encyclopedia of American Religions (Gale)
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